In a bid to boost Indian pharmaceutical export to Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), a business delegation comprising exporters and officials from Pharmaceuticals Export Promotion Council of India (Pharmexcil) will visit Russia, Turkmenistan and Ukraine from November 17 to December 1, 2018.

The delegation led by Raghuveer Kini, executive director of Pharmexcil will visit four cities viz. Kazan, Moscow, Ashgabat and Kiev for business meetings with the local pharma companies and regulatory bodies. The delegation will take part in buyer-seller meet in Kazan, capital of the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia on November 19 and will call on health ministry officials on November 20.

Tatarstan had in March dispatched an official delegation to promote investment opportunities in its region for India pharma manufacturers.

On November 22, it will attend buy-seller meet in Moscow and will meet health ministry officials next day to discuss regulatory issues.

The visit by Indian business delegation assumes significance as Russia, the largest market in the Central & Eastern Europe (CEE) region with emphasis on generic medicines, is set to implement a new regulation providing 25% preference to drugs produced in a full cycle in the Eurasian Economic Union in state medicine procurement tenders from 2019. Full cycle is related to production of APIs to formulation of the product. Besides this, Russia has come out with a few other mechanisms to promote domestic manufacturing under Pharma 2020 programme. Hence collaboration with local firms presents a huge opportunity for Indian drug makers in the country.

Pharmaceutical exports to Russia has increased by 22% in 2017-18 to $468 million ($383 million).

India's pharma exports to Russia constitute a sizable chunk but possibilities of joint investments are being considered by leading Indian pharma companies under Russia's Pharma 2020 programme, said a leading pharmaceutical consultant.

Indian companies including Advance Pharma, Hetero Labs are keen to enter the Russian pharmaceutical market and want to collaborate with Russian companies, opined Shubham Kumar, the Consul General of India in Vladivostok.

Russian domestic market is expected to provide significant opportunities to Indian drug manufacturers in the short-to-medium term, said Kini.

After Russia, the delegation will attend buyer-seller meet in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan on November 26 and will meet health ministry officials next day. India's pharma export to Turkmenistan declined by 22 per cent to $15.91 million in fiscal 2017-18. A number of Indian companies including Ajanta Pharma are supplying medical products to Turkmenistan.

In the last leg of tour, the delegation will visit Kiev, Ukraine for a buyer-seller meet on November 29. Next day, it will meet officials from health ministry.

Sales of Indian medicines in Ukraine has increased by 14.4 per cent to $95.96 million in fiscal 2017-2018. India exported pharmaceuticals worth $83.91 million in fiscal 2016-17.

India as a manufacturer was third in the volume of pharmacy sales in packages in 2017 after Ukraine and Germany, and in money term (the national currency) it was fourth after Ukraine, Germany and the UK. Macleods Pharmaceutical, Dr Reddy's, Euro Lifecare Ltd are among the Indian firms operating in Ukraine.